Assessment of anesthesia machine redesign on cleaning of the anesthesia machine using surface disinfection wipes

The use of surface disinfection wipes after induction of anesthesia improves anesthesia machine cleaning. We assessed whether anesthesia machine surface redesign improves disinfection wipe cleaning by anesthesia residents.

Sixteen anesthesia residents were assigned to 2 cases in series. The first case was randomly assigned to regional knee or hip surgery, a brief or detailed checklist, and the Perseus A500 (redesigned) or GE Aespire 7900 (conventional) machine. The second case was assigned to the opposite for each condition. Setup checklists included cleaning instructions. Eight machine sites representing redesign were contaminated with fluorescent gel prior to setup and reassessed after setup to assess cleaning efficacy. Cleaning was compared by fluorescence quantification of before and after setup images. Our primary hypothesis was that, overall, more sites would be cleaned on the Perseus machine. Our secondary hypothesis was that redesign would affect some sites.

Overall, the number of sites cleaned did not differ between machines (median 0.74 more sites out of 8 for the Perseus A500; 25th and 75th percentiles, -0.34 and 1.04; P = .093). However, greater cleaning was observed for the work surface and manual bag arm/hose of the Perseus machine (0.58 more sites out of 2; 25th and 75th percentiles, 0.35 and 1.05; P = .0004).

The number of sites cleaned overall did not differ between the conventional and redesigned Perseus A500 machines. However, the redesigned work surface and smooth manual bag arm features improved resident cleaning with surface disinfection wipes.